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Die Like a Dog

May 15, 2018

Pet dogs often have a peaceful death that forestalls protracted suffering and pain. Why can’t we do the same for humans?

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Die Like a Dog

Tuesday, May 15th, 2018

By Joseph Pierre,

I killed my dog last year. Mika was a shelter mutt, so she was around 10 or 12 years old; I can’t be sure. Twelve dog years would have put her at around 80 human years, which is a pretty good run. But what’s strange about having a dog is how quickly they age relative to us – they start out younger than we are, catch up for a time, and then pass us by, declining into their twilight years, all in the space of a decade or so. As witnesses to that accelerated timeline, having a pet means that we often end up experiencing their eventual demise and learning something about death in the process.

Mika was a great dog. Obviously abused before ending up at the shelter, she had scars on her head when I rescued her and, whenever I took a broom or rake in my hand, she would cower in fear. She was easily overwhelmed when other dogs came up to sniff her, and would often growl defensively. But with time she grew to be less apprehensive and almost pathologically affectionate, if there is such a thing with animals, demanding to be petted by anyone who happened to be near. She was a great companion watching TV on the couch during my single years, and she helped me win the attention of the woman, a veterinarian, who would eventually become my wife. In fact, my wife has often joked – and maybe it isn’t a joke at all – that she would never have gone out with me in the first place if I hadn’t had a dog.

… continue reading ‘Die Like a Dog’

Image: By DodosD – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17873917

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aeon

Hawaii’s New End-of-Life Law

May 7, 2018

Do the additional safeguards withstand scrutiny?

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Hawaii’s New End-of-Life Law

Monday, May 7th, 2018

By Katherine Drabiak

Last month, Hawaii became the seventh state, with the District of Columbia, to legalize physician-assisted suicide. Similar to some of the other state laws, Hawaii’s Our Care, Our Choice Act permits competent adults with a terminal illness and a diagnosis of less than six months to live to obtain a lethal prescription to use to take their own lives. Proponents assert the new law, in addition to giving patients a measure of control, autonomy, and dignity, also contains rigorous safeguards. Despite this rhetoric, Hawaii’s law, like legalized PAS in general, raises troubling implications for the standard of care and for transparency. It also highlights the immense power of a lobby, Compassion & Choices, to strategically politicize language and control the public discourse to make legal change appear to result from organic social shifts rather than orchestrated actions.

Terminology matters: framing a lethal prescription as a viable and even desirable alternative to addressing shortcomings in palliative and hospice care obfuscates that “care” and “choice” mean supplying vulnerable patients with a medication to end their life. Under the prevailing medical standard of care, patients who report feeling depressed, a burden to others, trapped, or hopeless, or are struggling with managing their medical condition would ordinarily trigger intervention to address risk factors for suicide. However, lobbyists’ use of euphemistic language may incrementally change how physicians and public health professionals respond to patients who express suicidal thoughts.

… continue reading ‘Hawaii’s New End-Of’Life Law’

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The Hastings Center

Alfie Evans’s Father Begs Pope Francis to ‘Save Our Son’

April 18, 2018

Father of seriously ill British toddler flies to Vatican to urge pontiff to intervene in legal fight

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Alfie Evans’s Father Begs Pope Francis to ‘Save Our Son’

Wednesday, April 18th, 2018

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The Guardian

Old, Sick and Dying in Shackles

March 7, 2018

“Compassionate release” has bipartisan support as a way to reduce the federal prison population and save taxpayer money. New data shows that it’s rarely used

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Old, Sick and Dying in Shackles

Wednesday, March 7th, 2018

Kevin Zeich had three and a half years to go on his prison sentence, but his doctors told him he had less than half that long to live. Nearly blind, battling cancer and virtually unable to eat, he requested “compassionate release,” a special provision for inmates who are very sick or old.

His warden approved the request, but officials at the federal Bureau of Prisons turned him down, saying his “life expectancy is currently indeterminate.”

Congress created compassionate release as a way to free certain inmates, such as the terminally ill, when it becomes “inequitable” to keep them in prison any longer. Supporters view the program as a humanitarian measure and a sensible way to reduce health care costs for ailing, elderly inmates who pose little risk to public safety. But despite urging from lawmakers of both parties, numerous advocacy groups and even the Bureau of Prisons’ own watchdog, prison officials use it only sparingly.

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The Marshall Project

Never Too Late to Operate?

February 28, 2018

Surgery near the end of life is common, costly. Nearly 1 in 3 Medicare patients undergo an operation in their final year of life

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Never Too Late to Operate?

Wednesday, February 28th, 2018

At 87, Maxine Stanich cared more about improving the quality of her life than prolonging it.

She suffered from a long list of health problems, including heart failure and chronic lung disease that could leave her gasping for breath.

When her time came, she wanted to die a natural death, Stanich told her daughter, and signed a “do not resuscitate” directive, or DNR, ordering doctors not to revive her should her heart stop.

Image: By CMSRC – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22239101

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KHN

At Some Veterans Homes, Aid-In-Dying Is Not An Option

February 13, 2018

California voters passed a law two years ago that allows terminally ill people to take lethal drugs to end their lives, but controversy is growing over a newer rule that effectively bans that option in the state’s eight veterans homes

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At Some Veterans Homes, Aid-In-Dying Is Not An Option

Tuesday, February 13th, 2018

Proponents of medical aid-in-dying and residents of the Veterans Home of California-Yountville — the largest in the nation — are protesting a regulation passed last year by the California Department of Veterans Affairs, or CalVet, that requires that anyone living in the facilities must be discharged if they intend to use the law.

That’s a position shared by most — but not all — states where aid-in-dying is allowed. As more U.S. jurisdictions consider whether to legalize the practice, the status of terminally ill veterans living in state-run homes will loom large.

“It would be a terrible hardship, because I have no place to go,” said Bob Sloan, 73, who suffers from congestive heart failure and other serious cardiac problems. He said he intends to seek medical aid-in-dying if doctors certify he has six months or less to live.

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KHN

Doctors Learn How To Talk To Patients About Dying

February 12, 2018

Lynn Black’s mother-in-law, who had lupus and lung cancer, was rushed into a hospital intensive care unit last summer with shortness of breath. As she lay in bed, intubated and unresponsive, a parade of doctors told the family “all good news.”

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Doctors Learn How To Talk To Patients About Dying

Monday, February 12th, 2018

A cardiologist reported the patient’s heart was fine. An oncologist announced that the substance infiltrating her lungs was not cancer. An infectious-disease doctor assured the family, “We’ve got her on the right antibiotic.”

With each doctor’s report, Black recalled, most of her family “felt this tremendous sense of relief.”

But Black, a doctor herself, knew the physicians were avoiding the truth: “She’s 100 percent dying.”

“It became my role,” Black said, to tell her family the difficult news that her mother-in-law, who was in her mid-80s, was not going to make it out of the hospital alive. Indeed, she died there within about a week.

Image By Seattle Municipal Archives from Seattle, WA – Doctors with patient, 1999, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9842204

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KHN

Physicians, Ethicists Urge Congress Not to Pass ‘Right-To-Try’ Legislation

February 2, 2018

Dozens of doctors, medical ethicists, and lawyers are warning Congress that legislation to allow Americans with life-threatening conditions access to unapproved, experimental drugs risks harming patients’ health

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Physicians, Ethicists Urge Congress Not to Pass ‘Right-To-Try’ Legislation

Friday, February 2nd, 2018

The letter was drafted by Alison Bateman-House, associate professor of medical ethics at NYU Langone Health, along with some of her colleagues. It is addressed to the leaders of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, the committee currently considering a so-called “right-to-try” bill. The letter was circulated for online signatures on Thursday, and organizers said they planned to send the letter on Feb. 5.

In August the Senate passed a right-to-try bill sponsored by Sen. Ron Johnson, which is now sitting in a House committee. The bill would allow patients with life-threatening conditions access to drugs that have not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb has expressed reservations about the bill, but President Trump seems to support it.

Image: By Intropin – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10621376

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STAT

Page 3 of 12«1 234 5...10...»Last »

Die Like a Dog

Die Like a Dog

Hawaii’s New End-of-Life Law

Hawaii’s New End-of-Life Law

Alfie Evans’s Father Begs Pope Francis to ‘Save Our Son’

Alfie Evans’s Father Begs Pope Francis to ‘Save Our Son’

Old, Sick and Dying in Shackles

Old, Sick and Dying in Shackles

Never Too Late to Operate?

Never Too Late to Operate?

At Some Veterans Homes, Aid-In-Dying Is Not An Option

At Some Veterans Homes, Aid-In-Dying Is Not An Option

Doctors Learn How To Talk To Patients About Dying

Doctors Learn How To Talk To Patients About Dying

Physicians, Ethicists Urge Congress Not to Pass ‘Right-To-Try’ Legislation

Physicians, Ethicists Urge Congress Not to Pass ‘Right-To-Try’ Legislation

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